DOVER-FOXCROFT – Maine Municipal Association delegates hope to make it loud and clear to congressional leaders this week that the Bush administration should not tinker with the Community Development Block Grant program.

In his 2006 budget, President Bush proposes to consolidate some of the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s programs – such as the CDBG program – with the Department of Commerce to eliminate duplicative efforts. His proposed plan also would likely eliminate rural housing and economic development programs, state officials say.

If the CDBG program is merged with the federal commerce department, supporters say that department would favor its programs and let the CDBG program slide. Maine communities, therefore, would be at risk of losing about $32 million dollars in block grant funds a year, they claim.

The furor raised over the possibility has not been lost on the Maine Municipal Association, which this week will send delegates to the National League of Cities Congressional City Conference in Washington, D.C. The CDBG and other HUD programs will be at the top of the agenda when MMA officials meet with the state’s representatives this week, Michael Starn, MMA’s communication director, said Friday.

“It’s really one [program] that they’ve gotten the bang for the buck in Maine,” Starn said. Communities that receive the funds can tailor their programs to meet the needs of their residents, he said.

Support for the program has not fallen on deaf ears in Washington, D.C.

U.S. Sen. Susan Collins this month outlined the importance of the grants in a letter she wrote to the Senate Budget Committee. She noted that the CDBG funds awarded each year allow communities to pursue infrastructure improvement projects and community economic development initiatives that otherwise would be unaffordable.

“If the administration’s proposed cuts to CDBG are enacted, I am concerned that communities in Maine will no longer have access to this critical stream of funding,” Collins wrote. “Further, the elimination of the Community Services Block Grant funding will place current projects in Maine at risk and will also make it difficult for Maine’s Community Action Agencies to mobilize new initiatives.” CSBG funds are provided to a network of local agencies for the reduction of poverty.

Facing a potential loss of $1.2 million in federal grant money, Bangor city councilors adopted a resolution earlier this month expressing support for the CDBG program.

“We need to restore that,” Council Chairman Frank Farrington said at the time. “It’s an important part of our infrastructure. Bangor relies on it. It’s been a wonderful government program which needs to be in there.”

In Dover-Foxcroft, where nearly $2.8 million in block grants have aided the town and surrounding communities in a variety of projects since 1992, the Bush administration’s proposal is unsettling. Municipal officials also have forwarded a resolution of program support to government leaders.

“It’s provided a tremendous amount … for housing repairs for low-income residents in the area,” Dover-Foxcroft Town Manager Jack Clukey said Friday.

Some of the low-income homeowners who have been assisted have been without indoor plumbing or have lived with pails inside their homes to catch the rainwater dripping through inadequate roofs, according to Ron Harriman of Harriman Associates of Bangor.

Harriman, a grant writer and administrator of CDBG funds in Piscataquis County and Penobscot County towns, said the competitive funds have been used to improve sewer and water lines and construct playgrounds, as well as for economic development projects, waterfront improvements, housing rehabilitation and a myriad of other projects. Since 1982, Penobscot County has received more than $27 million, and Piscataquis County has won more than $11 million in CDBG funds, he noted.

Harriman said the jobs developed through the opening of a Creative Apparel factory in Pine Crest Business Park and a new assisted-living center on outer Park Street, both in Dover-Foxcroft, likely would not have been created without the CDBG program.

A sampling of CDBG awards made this year to Maine communities, big and small, include the following:

. $500,000 for water system improvements and $500,000 for downtown improvements in Caribou.

. $40,000 for renovation of the community center in Brighton Plantation.

. $300,000 for a Head Start center in Unity.

. $300,000 for a community learning center in Washington County.

. $300,000 for a community center in Bradford.

. $500,000 for sewer system improvements in Ellsworth.

Harriman predicted that if the CDBG program is consolidated with Commerce, which has budget problems of its own, it would be the demise of these types of programs as they now operate. What bothers Harriman and municipal officials is that no details have been delivered by the president or his staff on what effect the consolidation would have on the program.

“What’s being proposed is to throw away a program for something that is a complete unknown,” Harriman said. “It would be one thing if it was fixing something that was broken, but that’s not the case here. The Bush administration is proposing to eliminate something that works and develop a new program without providing anyone with any details.”

Starn of the MMA went one step further.

“They’re nickeling and diming the domestic side of the budget and causing pain and suffering in communities that have come to rely on this program to do very important projects,” he said.